Peter Thiel is backing the Vaca Muerta oil field in Argentina
The founder of Palantir has long taken an interest in this Latin American country and moved to Buenos Aires with his family in April for a few months, holding meetings with President Javier Milei himself
Key points
US tech magnate Peter Thiel has invested around $76 million to acquire a 1 per cent stake in the Argentine oil company Vista Energy, one of the leading operators in the Vaca Muerta unconventional oil field in Patagonia. This emerged from documents filed on Friday with the US Securities and Exchange Commission by the Thiel Macro LLC fund, which state that the investment enabled Thiel to acquire 1.2 million shares in Vista.
The founder of Palantir has long taken an interest in Argentina and moved to Buenos Aires with his family in April for a few months, holding meetings with President Javier Milei himself, as well as government officials and representatives from the business world. Before his arrival in Argentina, Thiel had also purchased a large mansion in the Palermo Chico neighbourhood, one of the capital’s most elegant districts.
Shale gas and shale oil deposits
The Vaca Muerta field (Spanish for ‘Dead Cow’) is one of the world’s largest geological formations for the extraction of unconventional hydrocarbons (shale gas and shale oil). It is situated in the northern part of Patagonia, mainly within the province of Neuquén, though it also extends to a lesser extent into the provinces of Mendoza, Río Negro and La Pampa. It contains considerable reserves of shale gas (shale/marl gas) and shale oil trapped within the source rock at great depths (between 2,500 and 3,000 metres).
